


The Club

by Dafaolta



Category: Arrow (TV 2012), Batman (Movies - Nolan), Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-10
Updated: 2015-04-10
Packaged: 2018-03-22 04:28:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3715027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dafaolta/pseuds/Dafaolta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oliver and Felicity attend the Wayne Industries sponsored Tech Expo in Gotham with various others. Oliver discovers he's not as alone as he'd thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Canon for Arrow thru 2.08, loosely canon for Dark Knight and Iron Man films. Was posted originally on FF.net last year.
> 
> I Own Nothing But The Mistakes.

Oliver POV

I really hate these things. First because I have to let Felicity go off on her own and that's a lot harder these days than it has been. She's fine, mostly; I'm the nervous wreck. Thank God for Digg.

We were good walking through the hall after backing up the Applied Sciences people at the booth this morning. I saw Allen by the StarLabs booth, but they were 6 bodies deep and Felicity thankfully didn't want to wade through that. I'll probably have to sit through a geek-speak breakfast tomorrow, but I'll live.

Now all I have to do is survive tonight's social swirl without choking. Myself or anyone else. It's getting harder to be the playboy instead of the CEO here, when I really want to be home putting the fear of God into … somebody. I should be moving around, chatting up the competition's tech people and head-hunting. It's why we came, after all.

Instead of circulating, I'm watching Felicity head-to-head with Wayne Industries' Lucius Fox. From everything I know of him, Fox is as devious as his name, so I'm betting he's running a serious push to get her to switch to Wayne. I'm also betting she fleeces him for more secrets than he gains.

"You keep nursing that flute, you're going to lose your party-boy status."

Without looking away from Felicity, I say "It's domestic. I'll risk it."

"Sorry we're not up to your standards, Queen." Wayne comes up on my left, leaving the bulk of the room at his back. He gestures at Felicity and Fox with what looks like whiskey but smells like tea. "Lucius thinks he can turn her. I told him he's have better luck hiring Pepper away from Stark."

I past him look down the Hall to where Tony Stark is holding court. His arm is firmly around Ms. Potts' waist and neither of them looks in any way concerned about the picture they make. Since everyone knows she's his brain and his right hand, I suspect Stark's reaction to a successful head-hunter would be scorched earth.

I know Stark outed himself as Iron Man. He doesn't have a shy bone in his body, so I can't see him being able to keep that kind of a secret at the best of times. It doesn't hurt that he's as much of a genius as he thinks he is. Aside from my Girl Wednesday, he probably the smartest body in the room.

Wayne looks from Stark to Felicity. "It's the reactor in the chest thing I can't get past."

To be that open with Felicity, it might almost be worth it. Unlike Stark, I have Thea and my mom to consider, too. There are a lot more people in my life that I protect by hiding my face.

I glance back at Stark. No way in hell I could carry off that act. The playboy run aground on Lian Yu would have had the swagger, but not the spine. Now the spine is there, but I've had the swagger cut out of me along the way. Smacks too much of whistling past the graveyard and not worth the Universe's sure and certain retribution.

"I'll drink to that." I raise my glass in salute and Wayne does the same, though neither of us actually drinks. I have my own scars, but I'm betting Stark's collection is almost as bad, if not as varied.

"I was glad to see your mother was acquitted." Wayne is still speaking to me, but his eyes are surfing the balcony in front of us.

It's the one that faces out onto the street and it's the one I'd use if I were making an entrance. I can tell the security people from the guests by the earpieces and the shifting eyes, but they're obvious enough that I take a second look and I see Sara tucked back in the far corner. She doesn't appear to react to either Wayne's glance or mine, but I know she's aware of both of us.

The world shifts a little as I process what that means. Wayne. And Sara. And I have to be an idiot that I didn't see this sooner.

Gotham's Prince they'd called him, a man who'd watched his parents murdered before his eyes. Come back from the dead to reclaim his family's company. How did I miss these ... breadcrumbs? Neon signs more like!

I carry on our surface conversation, as much to gain some time to think as keep up my side of things. "We were surprised, but yeah, very grateful." This is actually the first time someone here has mentioned it to my face, but I'm grateful for that too.

"She shouldn't have been charged like that." Wayne shakes his head. "Donner's an ass. With an eye towards higher office, I believe. Politicians with a base to cultivate shouldn't be allowed to try cases like that."

I won't argue that, but I know she shouldn't have walked so easily.

"I've been told that Malcolm Merlyn was trained by the League of Assassins. Based on the police report of the attempt to arrest him, I tend to believe it."

I had a vivid flash of the room as Digg and I moved around their corpses on our way to stop Merlyn. It bothered me that I couldn't remember whether there'd been there or four men, but I'd been focused on Tommy in the corner.

Wayne's tone hasn't changed, but his face is suddenly a lot more serious. I'm betting on Sara as his source and I can feel my face wanting to harden. I can tell that what's coming next won't be good.

"They don't like cities much, especially ones where corruption is a fixture. They've tried for Gotham more than once." He meets my gaze and I can feel the force of his personality, of his sincerity. "I wouldn't expect them to stop helping Merlyn take Starling City apart, either."

"Merlyn's dead." I know. I'm the one who drove the arrow through his heart.

"Mmm, maybe. The League are harder to kill than they seem. As in sever their heads and set them on fire just to be sure."

"That's ... not good to hear." Understate much? The only reason I'm still standing here is because I know better than to howl in public.

"So I thought when I found out." There's a world of regret in his voice and I feel a tightening in my gut. Merlyn knows who I am and how to hurt me. If Wayne's right, nothing good is going to come from this.

He catches my eye again and studies me for a moment. Whatever he sees seems to decide him. "Their training regime is vicious, but I can show you some things. Useful things." He looks down at Stark. "We can show you some things. If you're interested."

"I'm interested." As in, can we start now? Breathe, Oliver.

"Good." Wayne smiles. "Welcome to the Club."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is set after the guests have all gone home and it's the two 'senior members' of the club discussing their opinions of Oliver. Obviously, neither he nor Felicity are present, so I'm going to have take on Ch. 1 next. As usual, I own nothing but the mistakes.

Wayne entered his suite after conferring with the Expo's security detail. Stark was comfortably ensconced in the one leather chair that faced the door, his glass sitting on the end table was almost empty.

"What did he say?"

Wayne went to the bar but poured out a mug of coffee rather than a drink. He had business to attend to after they'd talked and he wanted the heat as well as the caffeine. "He's in."

"Well that improves my opinion of his intelligence. I know some of the gossip about him, of course. Who doesn't? But I don't approve of the way he bailed out on his family with his mother in prison."

"My source says he hit the wall because of Merlyn's son. They were closer than brothers, but there was a girl in the mix."

"Isn't there always. I assume your source is your wounded dove."

"Yeah." Wayne seated himself on the couch facing Stark and loosened his tie.

"So what did you think of him? Can we help him or are we just gonna get him killed faster?"

"He's got a good head on his shoulders. And he's sharper than I'd feared, thank God." Wayne leaned forward, cupping his coffee. "We were facing the street-side gallery and I looked up, just doing a quick sweep of security. He followed my glance, did the same sweep and checked it for his own entry points, then did a second sweep and saw her."

"We all measure security by how we'd breach it. Could he?" Stark asked, swirling the ice that remained in his glass before getting up to refill it.

Wayne nodded. "A zipline grapple from the upper floors of the Harrington and he'd have been able to come in high enough to pick them off with a crossbow while they were still dodging glass. I just spoke to security about it, so no one else tries it tomorrow. But watching him put her and me together was like watching toast pop up. One. Two. Three. Aha! I doubt anyone else was aware of it, though. He's got a pretty good poker face."

"Good. I saw him eyeing Pepper and me while you were talking. There was a whiff of regret in his eyes, I think. Did you catch it?"

"Just measuring different situations, I think. Your personalities are so different, I don't think he's tempted to take your route. Whether consciously or not, like me he's chosen to be a symbolic figure. With a few alterations it could be anyone under that cowl, just like I think his bodyguard stepped in for him at least once. But for you, Iron Man isn't your alter ego, he's just you in a suit that can cash the checks your mouth keeps writing."

Stark grinned.

Wayne shook his head, smiling back. "He's not the boy who courted notoriety for the sake of having his face in the tabloids anymore."

"Just as well. That kid I would have shot myself, rather than risk him getting some innocent hurt because they got between him and a camera." Stark settled onto the other couch facing Wayne directly.

"He has more depths than that. And more of a purpose."

"You just like that he doesn't use a gun."

Wayne laughed.

"He's racked up a sizable body count all the same," Stark said.

"True. None of it accidental or collateral damage, though. And he's cut back on that since he's resurfaced, which will make working with the authorities easier down the road."

"Does he have back-up, do you think, or is he running this alone?"

"I'm pretty sure the bodyguard is in on it. Special Forces with an ex-wife in A.R.G.U.S. would be handy. There was an incident early on where Queen got himself caught on a security camera with the vigilante's hood in his hand. The police obligingly arrested him for the crime of being "The Hood" but allowed him out on home confinement with an ankle monitor. Which was very convenient given that the vigilante was sighted while the lead detective was rescuing Queen from what I suspect was one of Merlyn's hired killers. It was even more interesting when i found out that none of the thugs the vigilante took down had suffered anything but bruises and broken bones."

Stark nodded. "Not the bowman, then. Side by side, the bodyguard is bigger, but with a hood over his face and no skin showing, who'd know? Especially with the bow and the quiver distorting the impression."

"I can't prove it, but I'm betting Queen knew the cameras were there," Wayne said, smiling. "Trust me when I say that when you wear a mask, you're aware of them, especially when and where you go from one mask to the other. So. Nip the question in the bud, because it's going to occur to the bad guys first, before the police realize that Queen and the vigilante showed up at almost the same moment. Waving his bad boy persona at them all before they have a better handle on who he's become and you reinforce the 'I'm harmless, I'm useless' impression they had from before, when it was truer."

"You've thought a lot about that."

"Some. I'd wondered if the thing was planned in advance as executed or if they'd had to wing it. Having met the kid, I'm pretty sure he had it all planned out in advance. There's one thing the three of us have in common is that we're the alphas on our teams. We're the ones who make the decisions and initiate the action."

Stark nodded. "The blonde is going to need to be able to defend herself if he keeps watching her like that. Was your Fox able to raid the hen's house?"

"No. I told him from the outset it was a forlorn hope, but he had to try. He'd have had better luck trying for Pepper again."

"Only if you want your Fox stuffed and mounted over the table in my Board Room." Stark eyed him narrowly as Wayne laughed.

"He got the hint when you pulped the flowers last year; vase, box, note and all."

"I should hope so."

"He told me it was the fact that you'd turned his Hummer into a convertible that truly put paid to his attempts."

"He shouldn't be driving a monster like that. You could armor a hell of a lot smaller vehicle for half the money and he'd be twice as safe."

"Yeah, but his security detail won't fit in a Prius unless they leave him behind."

Stark snorted, leaning back into the couch. "Your source is obviously closer to what happened to the kid while he was missing, but Pepper got me a copy of the medical exam they gave him when he was found. If he was alone on that island, I'm a giraffe."

"No, I agree. If only because I've never heard of anyone flexible enough to tattoo their own back. He got dragged through Hell backwards, but I haven't heard any details on that. Whatever it was, it seems to have been the catalyst he needed to find his spine."

"Does your source have any insight on what happened?"

"All she'll say is that she has her scars and he has his. We want to know about his we'll have to ask him."

"Do you intend to? Ask him, I mean."

Wayne thought for a moment. Unlike Queen, he wasn't carrying a lot of scars; wounds had to be deep and nasty for them to leave marks on his skin. But he knew where they all were and he could feel the bones most when he was tired. "I think that unless they look like fracture lines that could break him, we should wait for an invite."

"Even the Bratva tat?"

"Camouflage is camouflage is camouflage. Does it worry you?"

Stark shrugged. "I suspect it probably has the easiest story, but I'm fine with not pressing the issue."

Wayne stood up and put the unfinished mug on the bar.

"You're going out?"

"Yeah, an ... unpleasant situation came up that I need to deal with."

"You know, of the two of us you're going to be the one who can be of the most immediate help. You and he have a similar way of operating, down to the alternative arsenal. I'm a gadgeteer and he doesn't use them that much as far as I can tell. I mean, I'll take a look at his bow and his arrows to see if there's anything I can offer there. Otherwise I'm little more than a critic and/or cheering section. I'm really good at telling people where they screw up, after all."

"But there's the other thing we all have in common. We've had to fight to get our companies back from hostile hands. He doesn't have a lot of help in how to run something as big as Queen Consolidated and he'll need it with his skillset."

"Or lack thereof." Stark said, rising. "I get that he's got a brain, even if he hasn't had a lot of practice using it. I got a few words with his tech goddess earlier and she's scary smart, but grounded enough not to leave her shoes in the microwave or something. I suspect your Fox will be watching QC's Applied Sciences people pulling some of his rabbits out their hats next year."

"Sucker bet."

"Exactly. My point is that he doesn't need to know everything himself. You and I operate that way because that's how we're made. He needs people he can trust to run the place for him and let him get on with being the public face of the company."

Wayne nodded. "Whatever else that island did to him, it gave him a gravitas even his father never managed. He'll be able to remind them who actually has the final say and make it stick. I think you'll allow that so far, he's done a pretty decent job when you consider he's got a night job and a very limited pool of allies."

Stark looked thoughtful. "It's kind of a shame his mother got caught with the blowback from Merlyn's plan. She showed a lot of spine to stand up and admit the truth. If there was any justice she'd have at least gotten credit for the lives she saved with her warning, not a death penalty threat."

"Yeah, but the verdict was still unexpected. And I'm not liking some of the reasons I can think of for it, either. In any case, she's his primary business resource and she only ran the show for a few months. The blowback isn't going to get any better because of the verdict and we can both help him keep his head above water while he learns to swim."

"That's an idea I can get behind."


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Team Arrow's take on the evening.

Digg and Felicity are in the suite before I get back. I needed air and time to process before I talked to them. I'm still not sure how to explain what happened.

"You okay, man?" Digg's good. He's asking if I need to break out my other suit in a way that won't alarm Felicity.

Felicity can see I'm off, even without the difference in Digg's tone.

"I've been researching our host," she says as she comes to embrace me.

"I don't think we need to worry about him," I tell her, putting an arm around her waist.

She shakes her head. "I'm not so sure. He was declared dead and resurrected almost 10 years back and the reports are that he had been in Tibet near the same place Merlyn trained after his wife died."

"I don't think we need to worry about him," I repeat. They both frown at me.

"You got that from your little chat tonight?" Digg asks, pushing.

"Did you see the security they had on the gallery?" I ask him.

He frowns, not understanding where I'm going and says, "Yeah. Four guys in tuxes with earpieces and underarm holsters."

"So you didn't see Sarah?"

"Where was she?"

"On the gallery. Wayne and I both saw her. And she saw both of us."

My Girl Wednesday got it almost immediately. "Oh, my!" She started laughing.

Digg looked at Felicity and then back at me. "So, you think she'd interfere if you needed Arrow him?"

"God, no. I think he could hand me my head all on his own. He'd have to work up a sweat, but ..."

Felicity smiles, hand on my chest. "I think you'd give him a run for his money," she says, before turning to Digg. "Oliver is not the only billionaire playboy who shares his city with a vigilante."

Where else would someone running from the League go if she wanted be both safe and useful? Batman.

At which point, all the tumblers click into place for him and Digg looks at me. "So, you've been made, then." A statement, not a question. Thank God they're on my side.

I nod and move away from Felicity so I can see both of them. "Wayne has had experience here in Gotham with how hard it is to kill the League's members. He confirms Malcolm survived."

I'm surprised at how hard it is to say that out loud. Digg was with me when I stabbed Malcolm. I know the arrow went through him. I felt him go limp against me as I pushed the whole of the shaft through my shoulder to free myself from his body.

But I never thought to check for a pulse. He was still able to trigger the second machine after I stabbed him. And I keep thinking of all the times I've been hurt, remembering Malcolm's first attack that put me in the hospital. I have a team; why wouldn't he?

Diggle is shaking his head. I know he's thinking the same things I am. Felicity, who heard me watch Tommy die, looks a little green but her head is nodding.

"I kept hoping that the reason nobody claimed his body was that there was no one left," she says, looking at me. "I guess it was because they already had him."

"With all that that means, Wayne is offering to show me some of what he knows so I have more to use against Malcolm when he comes back." Because he will come back and he will come for me. The hell of it is that he will more likely come at me through Thea or even try my ... mother. That's something I will need to deal with when we get back to Starling City. He knows about Diggle but he probably doesn't know about Felicity. Yet. Maybe.

One problem at a time, Queen. Focus.

"Apparently he isn't the only one willing to help, either."

Felicity's eyes are as wide as I've ever seen them. I find myself swallowing an urge to growl at how eager she is. "Tony Stark?"

"I wouldn't have thought a man who walks around in armor would have a lot of fighting techniques you could use." Diggle says, smiling at her squeak.

"I think it's the other half of the equation where he comes in," I say. "Both he and Wayne run their own multi-billion-dollar companies and have done so for years. I'm so far out of that league I don't count."

"Has the added benefit of keeping Isabel off your back if you can at least pretend to be talking to them about QC as well." Digg nodded.

"I'll take anything I can get on that front," I agree.

"So ... I'm guessing you want us to come along for this?" Diggle is looking at Felicity even though he's talking to me. I understand his concerns and I wish I thought I could talk her out of exposing herself now, but I'm learning to pick my battles. Mostly.

Felicity looks over at me with a small smile, telling me she knows that what I want isn't what I'm going to ask for. Looking at Diggle I say, "With the limited time we've got, I'd prefer you and I both get to run around with these guys. What I don't catch, I'm betting you'll pick up. Or you can bring popcorn."

Diggle laughs. I stood next to Wayne tonight so I have a better idea than he does of just how many bruises I'm going to have tomorrow night. They'll be worth it.

"So, after breakfast, huh?" Digg shakes his head. "I'm gonna hit the sack. Don't you two stay up too late."

It's a three bedroom suite, but I'm hoping we're only using two of them tonight. The click of the door latch is oddly loud in the sudden silence. Felicity looks at me and smiles as she holds out her hand.

I take her hand and turning it over, I press my lips to her palm, moving closer to her as our eyes meet. She cups my face with her other hand and I cover it with mine.

She slides her hands up the sides of my face and I move mine to her hips as we pull each other into a kiss. I've been aching to do this all day and I'm not going to rush. Clearly we're both on the same page here. Our tongues duel and I drown in the flavor that is only Felicity.

Digg will be grateful I got us into a bedroom before we peeled each other's clothes off. He also doesn't need to know how near a thing it was.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this and posted it on FF.net last year. This story began before 2.13 and I elected to keep the storyline I'd originally set up for Sara as I wrote it, here. But I did start incorporating Moira's betrayal from this point on. As always, only the mistakes are mine.

I decide I'm better off on the floor for a moment longer. Just to catch my breath. It's the third time Wayne has knocked me down with the same move and I need to take an extra moment to get my head clear. Because I'm clearly missing something.

I sit up and look over at Diggle who's been watching us carefully. "Can you see what I'm missing?"

Diggle nods. "He's got you reaching and you're going off balance to make the grab."

Duh. Sneaky man. No wonder I like him.

I stand up and we try it again. This time I don't take the bait and I'm able to land a solid hit. Wayne nods and we go again.

While Wayne is sweeping me off my feet, Felicity is sitting with Stark and Sara and Pepper. I can see Felicity wince every so often, but she's carefully not watching us. I can tell by the clock that we really only have a few more minutes, but I know I'm going to need longer working on these moves before they're second nature.

At the top of the hour, Wayne excuses himself. He's got a delegation to meet and wants a shower before he goes. Stark has been looking at my bow and some of my newer stunt arrows.

"How do you compensate for the different weights?" he asks, holding up the flash-bang and the grappler.

I shrug. "The weight determines the angle of the arc, thus the angle of the shot. I try to be sure they'll fly right before I produce multiples of them, so it can take a few tries to get the placement for the cargo in relation to the shaft length. The grappler took some time because the package had to be close enough to the point that it would use the arrowhead as part of the anchor without risking the assembly being snapped off while I'm still swinging from it or having it be too bulky to actually fly in the first place."

Felicity shivers a little at that. She hates heights and she hates having been part of the cargo when I've swung from it. It's still stronger than some things I've swung thru windows on.

Stark is looking at the shafts again. "We've been working on a next-generation polymer that could help get you better distance as well as a better weight ratio on the shaft, but I'm not sure how much that would save you with the re-engineering on these purpose-built arrows."

I shrug. "No way to know without testing them, I suppose."

"How do you practice?"

I turn to Pepper, who's come up behind with Sara.

"He kills tennis balls," Diggle says, with a straight face.

"In job lots," Felicity agrees, her grin breaking through at the end.

The other three look at me as if I'm going to correct them. "I load a couple cans of balls into a bucket and tip them out, then shoot them as they bounce." I mean, it's not like Oliver Queen can just go to some archery range in Starling City and shoot at targets.

Stark understands. "Random motions and unpredictable pathways. Low tech, but effective. I'd like to see you do it sometime."

"Sure."

Wayne comes back into the room as Stark is speaking. "The third lower level of the garage here is ... closed to outsiders. You could show him, us, there if you'd like."

"Now?" asks Stark.

Wayne shakes his head, whether in amusement or just negation I can't tell. "The Expo closes at 4. The civilians will all be gone by 5:00 or 5:30 at the latest. If you can constrain your impatience till then, I'd be grateful."

Before Stark's inner child can protest, I say "That'll be fine." They both look at me as though I wasn't really part of the discussion. Wayne smiles and nods, while Stark shrugs.

"5:30 it is, then." Stark says, with a nod at me and taking Pepper by the arm, leaves. Suddenly there's a lot more air in the room.

Wayne turns to me and says, "If you're feeling pressured by Tony, don't hesitate to tell him where to get off. He knows he's over the top and he won't think less of you for it."

I shake my head. "I have no problem showing him what I do. He wants to help with the materials and the designs, he has to be able to see how I use them. And if he weren't at least as smart as he thinks he is, he'd be dead by now."

Wayne laughed. "Too true. I know you're going back to Starling City tomorrow morning, but I'd like to talk business, actual commerce, over dinner tonight if the three of you will join us? I don't know what Stark's schedule is in detail, but he may be able to join us as well."

"I'd like that. In either case."

"Good. We'll see you later, then."

I pack my gear back into the new bag Felicity designed for me. It looks like a kind of keyboard case, but it's twice as deep and carries the green leathers on one side and the bow and arrows on the other. Diggle picks it up after I snap the locks shut. He'll take it back to the suite while I'm showering. Then Felicity and I will go back down to the Expo floor.

Felicity has her phone out as we board the elevator. "We didn't bring tennis balls, did we?" Diggle and I both shake our heads. "There's a sporting goods store about 6 blocks from here that stocks them in bulk."

"Send me the details," Diggle says. "I'll go pick some up while you're down on the floor."

"Thanks." I say, to both of them.

Diggle grins. "Oliver, those two might have been at this for longer than we have, but they wouldn't be interested in helping if they didn't think you were worth the effort. They clearly think you do good work and they want to help. I'm all for all hands on deck if the League decides Malcolm had the right idea. And even if none of that happens, it's good to have friends who understand how we spend our nights."


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is Felicity's chapter. Her take on the whole Expo and the other players, sort of the Ladies Auxiliary of the Club as well as the Members themselves.

When the flyer for the Tech Expo first came across my desk it seemed like a great way to boost QC and Applied Sciences to people who's first thoughts weren't about Unidac and the Glades. It was addressed to Oliver, not Moira or Walter like most of his CEO mail. Looking back on that now, I can see I should have been more aware.

I wanted to go, selfishly, because there would be people I could really talk to without having to use small words. I'm teaching my boys to speak geek, but its nice it to speak to natives. Isabel seemed to think it was a waste of time, but she didn't actively oppose the trip.

Barry stopped by the booth for a couple of seconds. Oliver had been out picking up coffees for the staff who'd come with us, so he didn't see Barry, which I think was deliberate on Barry's part. He still admires Oliver and the Arrow, but he knows that Oliver is less comfortable around him. I was glad to see him looking so well, but I was grateful for his discretion.

The cocktail party opening night had been fun. I was grateful for the way that Oliver and Digg settled for watching me without needing to keep me within direct reach. Lucius Fox was a fun challenge. He was trying to recruit me, though he wasn't putting a huge amount of effort into it. He gave me some interesting ideas that I'm going to have to bounce off some of the Applied Sciences people we didn't bring. I don't think it was deliberate, but he sheds ideas like a wed dog shed water.

I was a little concerned when Oliver didn't return to the suite with us. I'd seen him talking with Bruce Wayne earlier in the evening and I'd been aware of a change in him by the time they parted. It wasn't something anyone who wasn't familiar with his different masks would be able to see, but I could see he'd taken a blow.

Waiting for him to check in, I'd done some research on Bruce Wayne. I realized as I got into it that I should have done this before we even accepted the invitation. How had I forgotten that he'd gone missing long enough to be declared dead? Coupling that with the fact that he'd been found in Tibet, I was beside myself by the time Oliver showed up.

Once Oliver told us all of his conversation with Wayne, I was a little shell-shocked. Batman AND Iron Man wanted to help the Arrow! It was kind of odd to find that what Digg & I saw in Oliver was appreciated by the people I could only think of as his peers. And yet it was comforting to find that we weren't the only people who recognized the good he was doing.

When Digg took himself off to bed, giving us some privacy, I was grateful for his discretion. I'd been worried about Oliver all evening and I wanted to be able to enjoy being with him without worrying about interruptions. Even knowing Batman was going to be running the Arrow through a superhero bootcamp in the morning didn't bother me.

Making love with Oliver is like a gymnastic competition. We did make it into his bedroom before he had me up against the door. The bed got a workout of its own and we finished with a second shower after the bathtub proved irresistible.

Breakfast was fun. I had only met Sara briefly when her need to check up on her family had brought the League of Assassins after her and us. She was quiet, like Oliver. And Like Oliver I could believe there was a lot of thinking and evaluating going on behind that silence. There was a sadness there too that was like Oliver's, but the way she watched Bruce Wayne told me she was working her own way out of it. Like Oliver.

Pepper Potts is amazing. Before Oliver, I wasn't as interested in the doings of billionaires. After I'd joined Team Arrow I was vicariously interested in people like Tony Stark, which of course meant that I found myself reading a lot about Pepper Potts.

She's a genius and she's capable of reining in the craziness that is Tony Stark. That alone would be enough. The thing is that they work as a team and they respect each other equally. And it doesn't hurt that they're clearly crazy about each other.

Pepper had even Sara laughing when she talked about how Stark had reacted to Fox's attempt to recruit her at the last Expo. It's typical of Stark's out-sized personality, and kind of a one-upmanship between him and Wayne. Oliver would growl, but he wouldn't do anything more active against either Fox or Wayne.

I tried not to listen to the three of them thumping, mostly on Oliver. I know that Oliver won't stint on his efforts to absorb whatever Wayne can teach him. One constant for Oliver has been that the mission comes first; he's more interested in accomplishing his goal than getting through it with a whole skin. After all, one of my special nightmares is the way he stabbed Malcolm Merlyn with an arrow he drove through his own chest first.

Stark watched them without contributing much more than a grunt now and again. I think he was more interested in seeing what Oliver is capable of than in testing him personally. As Digg said, a man who wears a suit of armor is going to use a whole different set of skills than our bowman.

When Wayne stepped out, Stark started talking with Oliver about his weapons. I know how much effort Oliver puts into getting his specialized arrows to work and it was good that Stark was interested in them too. Oliver so focuses on what he can't do, hasn't done, doesn't know, that it's hard to get him to see how strong his positives are. I have to say that the changes I made to his original lair were what I needed for me to be able to work to my peak there, but he'd set up a pretty good base to begin with and I don't think he remembers that either.

I suspect that Pepper's question about practicing was meant to see if she could get Oliver to show Stark what he can do. It was fun to tease Oliver about his murderous tendencies with tennis balls. I saw Sara make the connection almost immediately. An assassin would know how to make everyday things work for you without needing high tech toys.

The best thing about the whole morning, as far as I was concerned, was watching all four of those people treat Oliver as a normal person. All of them were aware of how weird and dangerous our lives are and it was simply a given. It was all just background noise that formed the basis for everything else, not something odd enough to be remarked on.

Even though both Stark and Wayne looked him over, saw all of his scars, they weren't looking out of some kind of morbid curiosity. It was two fighters evaluating the physical capabilities and conditioning of the third. I noticed Stark looking at the tattoos, but he said nothing about them to us.

Sara's seen Oliver shirtless before, but Pepper was, I think, unprepared for how extensive his scars were. To be fair, there are more now than there were when he first came back. Seeing her see him for the first time reminded me of how much he's put himself through for this crusade of his and I know the most painful ones, Tommy's death and Moira's betrayal, don't show on the surface.

Oliver and I went back to the suite where he showered, alone in spite of serious blandishments. I caught a glimpse of some of the bruises beginning to bloom on his ribs and I texted Diggle to see if the tennis ball store had arnica so I could at least help him sleep more painlessly. Digg thinks Oliver sleeps better with me than he ever does alone, but it's not something I've ever had the courage to ask him about.

Nightmares and their sources stray too close to the forbidden ground of the island for Oliver to talk about them easily. They're part of his penance, I think. As though his subconscious can't allow him even the peace of unterrorized sleep. Of course, I sleep better for being able to hold onto him and feel him safe with me, so it's not something I would willingly jeopardize with questions either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to make mention here of the stuff Oliver had done before Arrow was a Team. It wasn't as pretty as what Felicity has done with the lair (at least it doesn't still rain in the basement after all) and I wanted to make mention of the fact that the trick arrows had to come from somewhere other than Cabela's.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Tennis Ball Massacre!

Felicity's idea of the arnica was genius. I hadn't counted on just how many bruises I was going to wind up with after that sparring session. I'll pass it on to Digg, but he's going to have to put it on by himself.

It took a little experimenting to get the balls to fall and bounce. I wound up using a sawhorse and an ice bucket and a length of twine. Felicity also tossed a few up for me to practice on. I only brought the arrows that will fit in the case, so the test fires needed a little hand sharpening before the show.

I'm not surprised that Sara is the first one to join us. She'd texted the door code to Felicity about an hour after we split up, so she would be aware that we'd used it. I'm sure she's been watching the security feed from somewhere, just to be careful.

Stark and Pepper follow with Wayne himself a couple moments later. I figured Stark would have been down here before us if it hadn't been for the key code. His open enthusiasms are easier to take because I can see Felicity's babbles as part of the same root. I'm still glad to only have to deal with him in small doses.

When they're all ready, I take off my suit jacket and strap on the quiver and then Digg pulls the rope, tipping the bucket out. We were only able to get 9 balls into the bucket, so the show is over pretty quickly. Sara's smiling her approval as Wayne nods. Stark's lit up like a kid at a carnival, while Ms. Potts is more quietly impressed. I'm mostly relieved not to have hit any of the audience.

Both Stark and Wayne test arrows by pulling them out of the wall. I'm pleased that they're both a little surprised at how deeply the heads were lodged. Remember guys, I put my life in trust to those arrowheads. Even more important, I've trusted her life to them.

I glance over at Felicity, who's smiling rather smugly. Pepper looks at Stark and then over at me.

"At first, I'd wondered why a longbow instead of a crossbow," she says with a shrug. "Now I can see. You could never get a crossbow to fire that many shots that quickly."

My turn to shrug. I chose the bow mostly because it was Shado's and Yao Fei's before; the same reason for the hood. But yeah, there's also the matter of training and habit and simple muscle memory that mean that this is the kind of bow I'm fastest with.

"There are ways to essentially set up a crossbow the way you would a handgun, with a preloaded clip, but yeah, after that clip is done the reloading requires your attention on the crossbow rather than the action, so..." And unless you use it like a club, the crossbow itself is not as much use in a fight as my longbow.

Both Wayne and Stark are nodding. Wayne because, like me, he knows it's the fight that's the point, not the weapon you use. Stark because all three of us know that your most important weapon is the one between your ears.

Stark twirls the arrow he's holding and asks "How many of these do you lose in a night?"

That's not a question I've considered. I buy the shafts in lots of 10,000 and I'm on my 4th so far, so I guess I lose more than I'd realized. The heads are different because the trick arrows use different heads than my ... everyday arrows. And while I'm doing all this thinking Stark is looking at me as though I'm counting with my fingers and toes.

"I don't usually count them as 'lost' if they hit their target," I explain. "And usually, pulling them out of somebody isn't worth the effort for the shaft or the head. This quiver holds 24 at a time and when Digg comes out as backup I keep a couple of reloads in the trunk. But most nights I run through 10-12 just running patrol."

"So the chances of somebody tracking what kinds of materials you use for your shafts..."

I nod. "Pretty good. The SCPD has pockets of competence, so they would certainly have enough samples to compare new ones to. I have three suppliers that I'm using, rotating orders and delivery points so that we haven't had the same supplier use the same set of points yet, though eventually they will."

They're both nodding again. I guess I'm less of an idiot than they'd expected? Gratifying, I guess, but come on guys, I'm not suicidal.

Stark is looking at my hands, and I nod.

"I don't barehand my arrows ... outside. Once the heads are sharpened, they're staged to be loaded into the quiver or into the carrier and they're wiped down with a chamois from head to fletchings. The carrier is leather, as is the liner of the quiver, as are my gloves. It reduces the potential for trace evidence on any shaft that gets found ... uncontaminated by a body, like the trick arrows."

Wayne is smiling, as is Sara. I guess the 'I'm not stupid' subtext in my tone wasn't all that subtle. Sue me.

I've thought this out pretty carefully, even when I was expecting to be able to do this by myself. Now that both Digg and Felicity are involved, and by their continued silence equally complicit under the law, I'm a lot more paranoid about what I leave behind.

Stark, predictably, is amused. I guess Wayne was right about telling him where to get off. That and I suspect that his ego's armor is a lot thicker than Iron Man's.

"Good," he says, still grinning. "We have a couple of polymer types that might prove useful. They aren't patented yet, so there's no record of their make-up to be tagged back to SI. I'll have some of each run up for you and see if they make enough of a difference."

"I'd like Fox to take a look at that grappler assembly of yours," Wayne says.

Digg has pulled the other arrows out of the wall and Wayne hands him the one he's been holding. Digg puts them back in the carrier. I hand him the quiver and then I put the bow in myself.

I hand Wayne one of the grappler heads. "Easier to carry than the whole assembly." He nods and hands it off to Sara, who makes it disappear.

Wayne looks at his watch and then over at Stark. "Do you have to be back any specific time?"

"They'll see me when they see me." Because, of course, no one holds mad geniuses to timetables.

Felicity hands me my suit jacket and I look over at the other two. These suits are really more of a costume than my leathers are, in spite of the mask I wear with them (thank you/damn you, Barry Allen). These civilized facades are really just protective coloration we wear to confuse the general population about the hunters in their midst. People forget that men's clothing fastens left over right so the right hand can draw a sword without getting caught on anything.

Wayne grins at Stark and turns to us. "Fox tells me there are a few patents in Unidac's portfolio that could form the basis of a couple of joint ventures."

I nod because my Girl Wednesday has primed me carefully on four she thinks are good candidates. Stark is nodding, too. She's told me about two others she thinks he could be interested in, as well.

"I have the staff in the suite ready to serve us when we're ready to eat," Wayne says, looking at the three of us in turn.

I look over at Digg. "Isabel won't need the jet before next week, as I recall."

He shakes his head.

I look at Felicity. "Were you going to go to Coast City before Friday?"

She gives me a crooked smile and shakes her head. I try not to be too possessive about her time when she already puts so much of it into my two jobs, and she is kind enough not to stress me too much when she needs her personal time.

"Then we're good." I say.

The food is excellent, the company is stimulating. I think we rarely find ourselves in social situations where we can be our mostly-unguarded selves. It's a very strange feeling for me because I never considered myself part of a group of like-minded ... vigilantes.

Wayne has been part of the Justice League and Stark coexists within the Avengers, but for me the only team I'm part of is the one that keeps me alive night after night. For the most part, I consider myself a loner. I could work with others, I suppose, but they'd have to be people I could trust and, let's face it, people who would do as I say.

We're sitting around the table after the dishes are cleared away. Stark looks at Wayne, who looks back. Something passes between them, but I don't know either of them well enough to guess at it. I suspect it has to do with me and when Stark turns to look at me, I figure he's going to ask something I'd rather not talk about.

"You can tell me to piss off," Stark begins, leaning in, "but I can't help wondering what possessed you to do this?"

Could have been worse. I shrug and decide that this is not the place to bring out the story I usually tell about my dad. "When the Gambit went down, I made it to the life raft. My dad was there already, and the captain. We didn't see anyone else then or later. We drifted for ... days. I was in and out of it so I have no idea how long we drifted or where.

"We didn't have much in the way of food or water and my dad kept making sure that I got water and I got food. I remember the captain complaining that it was all we had and my dad telling him that if any of us made it, it was going to be me. My dad told me that he wasn't the man I thought he was, that he hadn't done what he should have for the city. That he'd taken more than he'd given and he had hoped to have time to fix the wrongs he'd done.

"He gave me a book, a small bound notebook. He told me that I had to survive and get back to Starling to make things right. Then he pulled out a handgun and shot the captain and then he shot himself in the head."

My mother is the only other person I've told about that. What does it say about me that it was easier to tell these people than anyone else? I look at Wayne, who is nodding; his parents were killed before his eyes so he knows a thing or two about legacies. Stark, if the stories are true, was betrayed by his partner and basically survived because he was worth more to his captors than the bounty originally paid.

There's a look in his eyes of places best not seen by men, as though he's only partially come back from there. And suddenly I understand that he's claustrophobic and stuck inside that armor in order to keep living. A large chunk of that bravado is a kind of whistling past the graveyard. Wow.

So I continue, to finish what he started asking. "I discovered that there were names written in that book. And when I got home, I found out that most of the people on that list were basically scum. People who had used their positions of privilege to enrich themselves at the expense of the less fortunate around them. Like my family had. It wasn't something I could let stand.

"We didn't find out about the Undertaking and what it meant until it was almost too late to stop it. In the end, obviously, Malcolm was able to trigger the second device I hadn't anticipated and the Glades went to hell."

"To be honest," Stark says, shaking his head, "I wouldn't have expected a second device, either." Wayne nods.

"Before the earthquake I had been pretty ruthless in terms of who I killed in the course of a mission. If there hadn't been that second device, if we'd been able to stop it from happening, I probably would have been able to walk away. Coming back, trying to pull QC out of the ditch, I couldn't keep being that kind of ruthless. It cost too much. So, not the Hood, the Arrow."

Sara looks at me and nods slowly. If anyone here understands that cost, it's her.

"And so far, the Triads and the drug dealers and the other gangs keep me busy when I'm not losing my mind over contracts and balance sheets."

Felicity snickers a little at that last part. She's watched me go over contracts with a law dictionary and the law department on speaker phone more than once. Since I caught a mistake they missed, they've been a lot more cooperative, but it's still tedious and eye-crossing.

"Until you can trust the people you work with," Wayne says, "you have to check anything you're going to sign."

Stark nods. "I've been bitten often enough by that to check too. It'll seem less like Greek after a while."

That's a relief. I've been feeling kinda terminally stupid about it all. I guess because I know how ill-prepared I really am I just expect that everyone else can see it too. Gotta stop that.

We left for the airport that night with all 6 of the deals Felicity had selected ready to be submitted to the Legal Department, and Isabel, in the morning. I'm pleased that the deals all seem fair to both sides and I expect to hear some squaking about that, but I can deal with that. i think that the best thing that came out of this weekend is the confirmation that I am not without allies beyond my Team.

Wayne and Stark both shared a look behind their facades that I had never expected to see. I'm reassured to find that I'm not that much of an oddity and, regardless how I started this double life, I'm not the only crazy man to choose it. And thank you/damn you Tony Stark, I'm not even the craziest man to do so. All that remains is to see if I can devise some pretext for this Club to come meet in Starling City.


End file.
